


Anatomy

by TerminalVelocity



Category: Original - Fandom
Genre: M/M, Poetry, from start to finish, putting all the poems from this relationship in order as best I can, to create the Anatomy of a Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-09
Updated: 2020-06-21
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:41:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 18
Words: 2,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24632479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TerminalVelocity/pseuds/TerminalVelocity
Summary: An Autopsy of a relationship from start to finish, in poetry, written during the duration. This is what losing the person you thought was your soulmate feels like. He was my muse, my reason for creation, the inspiration for so many long abandoned plots and stories on other profiles.... It has been nearly a year now, and I am learning to be my own muse. To create for myself, instead of someone else.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 3





	1. Chapter 1

**_For Beauty-_ **

And so…

I will write to you in words  
Of beautiful and historic love.  
In faded flowers no less fragrant  
Than a half-forgotten memory.

My pen will flow over pale pages  
No less flawless than your skin,  
O Beauty,  
In ink the same shade as your eyes…

When such memory and thought fail me,  
I shall look on you with eyes of love,  
And pray with every quickening beat of heart  
That you find meaning in the depths.

I will pray that my eyes speak to you the volumes  
That my pen has yet to write  
Across memory and time unending.


	2. Chapter 2

_**POPPIES** _

_Say you’ll remember me-_

With a sunset smile   
And eyes like fire.

_Say you’ll remember me-_

When the cold moon rises  
And the shadows dance between the trees.

_Say you’ll remember me-_

When the song has no words left  
And the drums stop beating. 

_Say you’ll remember me-_

When the flowers fade  
And the wind goes cold on your skin.

_Say you’ll remember me-_

When all is hard and hollow  
And the silence echoes in marble halls.

_Say you’ll remember me-_

When there is nothing left of me  
Nothing but a name  
Written on the stones beneath your feet.

_Say you’ll remember me-_

When I am ashes  
And my fire has gone out

When I cross the bridge to the Summerlands  
Through the mists past Avalon  
And into the World of Dream

_Say you’ll remember me-_

And tell them, please,  
That I am going Home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was written immediately after my diagnosis, when I made the decision to postpone my surgery and asked him to come see me before I went under. Just in case... the worst happened.


	3. Chapter 3

**_ENDEARMENT_ **

Come now, and I will touch you-  
Lay you out before me  
A priceless treasure  
Cherished.

Breathe for me, and I will caress you-  
Rise and fall  
My heart given form  
 _Mo anam cara._

Be still, and I will give you all you desire-  
The pleasures of body and mind  
My ideal  
 _Elskede._

Release your need and I will fulfill you-  
Pale skin over willing flesh  
My passion  
Sweetling.

Cry out for me, and I will catch you-  
Enfold you in warm arms  
Your surety  
Beloved.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I opened my soul and poured out everything that was in it... and this was the result


	4. Chapter 4

**_SOUL DESIRES_ **

The soul desires-

All the things  
It cannot, should not,  
Must not want.

It longs after every thing  
That has ever been forbidden:

The shape of you by moonlight  
The color of your hair by sunlight  
The warmth of your skin at dawn  
The cadence of your breath at dusk-

Your heart beats,  
Errant and inescapable  
Beneath my fingertips,  
Beloved of my Soul.

The wicker cage of your ribs  
Containing the very essence  
Of all it is to be you,  
All that I love-

Your breath,  
That causes you to sing  
Your heart,  
That is given that you might love-

I am undone-

As all men before their gods  
Are undone.  
In you,  
I have found all of grace and beauty.

Here then, do I stand-  
A man on fire with yearning  
His every breath desire  
After his Beloved.

So then do I cast the very heart of me  
Here at your feet,  
Praying mercy to every god and power:  
Do not leave me to drown in the sea of my desire.

You are mine ideal,  
Taken shape and given form.  
You are beloved of heaven,  
Crafted in glory and honor-

Here do I stand,  
A man bereft and loved by loss  
With words less than you deserve-  
Make of me what you will-

Do with my heart as you decide.  
I am as you wish me to be,  
My Soul’s Desire.


	5. Chapter 5

**_ELSKEDE_ **

Come now and let me gaze upon you-

Allow me this:  
The look of your eyes by night  
Your skin  
No less pale and perfect than the distant moon.

Come again and I will touch you-

Your hand in mine,  
Flesh to flesh in the dark.  
Your voice,  
The only music my soul cries out to hear.

Come now, and I will hold you-

Cherished forever,  
Safe in my arms, your tower.  
Your heart  
The drum that calls my feet to dance and my lips to sing.

Come again and I will whisper prayers-

Thanks for your presence  
Never ending hymns of praise  
To the One  
Who has given you back into my Keeping.

Come now and touch me-

My heart stops. Mine eyes dazzle.  
Enchanted and entranced.  
Your love,  
The greatest gift I could hope to win...

Your heart the goal  
Your hand the prize  
Your kiss a benediction unlooked for-

For you would I move mountains.  
For you would I descend into Hel and rise to Valhalla.  
For you, would I do whatever you choose...

I am yours for the taking.


	6. Chapter 6

_**MO ANAM CARA** _

Give me a love  
That sinks into my bones

That builds its lair  
In the cage of my ribs

That howls  
With every beat of my heart

Give me a love  
That burns like fire

Stoked with every longing glance  
And whispered word.

That rages on in silence  
Fanned higher with distance.

Give me a love  
Strong enough to break me.

Savage and ravening  
Brought to heel by your touch.

Glowing under the moonlight  
Blazing with the sun.

Give me a love  
To shake the heavens and bring the apocalypse

To raise the dead  
And rattle the gates of hell.

And I,  
I will be the hound beside you  
And the sword in your hand.

The shield on your back,  
The wind in your sail,  
And the song on your lips-

> _There will you find Home._


	7. Chapter 7

**_SOLIPSIST_ **

I am packed  
With broken glass  
And memories-

And in all,  
All hurts.

And yet still  
What Art is made  
of pain and doubt  
That lies within the soul!

What mosaics  
Spun of vibrant hue  
Borne of such fearful symmetry-

Shadow all behind,  
Left streaming  
Deep into Dark.

What lights the Dawn  
What brings the sunrise-  
More than this  
Gentle hope?

That from the broken  
And the damned  
Some joy and peace  
Will come-

When all the colors run together;  
Each shattered piece  
Laid in gold  
Next to its Other-

If all that may be certain known  
Is this cage  
Of flesh and bone

Then I would live  
Within the spaces of your breath,  
The line of skin on skin

Your wall, a hedge  
Strong tower, defendant-  
Stained glass windows, in rain.


	8. Chapter 8

**_ANATOMY_ **

_It feels like this-_

Like swearing Blood and Breath  
and Until Death  
For all the millennia I have held you beneath my skin  
Your blood with mine  
in the hollow wicker cage of my aching ribs-

And feeling the chasm sink  
Fathoms and fathoms down  
Until we’re standing on two separate continents,  
with your heartbeat in my ear  
And your head on my shoulder-

Cold with your warmth next to me  
Dry eyes and burning lungs  
clinging

To abandoned hopes and want of wish-fulfillment  
That echo down the halls of my mind  
That cling to the iron in my veins  
No bar to the yearning  
In spite of myself.

Alone in the wanting of it  
Half-forgotten lines of poetry  
Written on your skin  
In the dim recesses of a shared midnight.

Whispered praise and heady sighs  
Marking the cadence of shared desire  
left hollow and empty  
in the face of unrequited desperation-

One more touch  
One more kiss  
One more brush of skin on skin….

_The shape of you by moonlight, Beloved-_

Words from a thousand voices not my own,  
Sought after as puzzle pieces,  
Brought together in amalgam   
To give vent to every unspoken plea.

_It feels like this-  
_

Falling to my knees in impatient desperation  
After clinging to you post-separation-  
To see the shine of silver on black velvet  
Lifted from its prison to your skin  
Words spoken, wrung out, needy  
Too tear-blind to see

And maybe it’s better that I never heard  
What you asked in response a week later  
Better not to linger  
Over promises made and discarded

In spite of ourselves,  
Time makes liars of us all.


	9. Chapter 9

**_STAINED_ **

Would you run away with me  
For the next five minutes?  
There are so many lives I want to share with you-  
I can be your harbor  
The earth of a hundred nations in my skin-

It was years ago, God knows,  
When you strained to tell me your whole truth-  
But you were not mine to save.

But I am turning in revolutions,  
The constant satellite of your blazing sun-  
I’d do anything for you.

More than jewels for the neck,  
Words kept in my heart like a treasure  
And that’s worth more than gold… that’s love-

I remember….

But it’s so hard to say the words  
For what I mean,  
when you’re not leaving…

I have loved you for a thousand years  
But please, don’t come Home.

I sought for you with bloody feet  
Across hallowed ground  
Howling, Yearning-  
Wine with the selfish prayers on my breath.

Too much and not enough  
Broken pieces taken apart and put back together  
Just like my stained-glass heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lines from songs not mine-
> 
> Run Away With Me - Michael Arden; Harbor - Vienna Teng, Enough To Go By - Vienna Teng
> 
> Enough To Go By - Vienna Teng
> 
> Gravity - Vienna Teng; Anything For You -LUDO
> 
> J'envoi Valser (translated) - Zazie
> 
> I Remember - Dianne Reeves
> 
> Don't Come Home - Emma Blackery
> 
> A Thousand Years - Christina Perri; Don't Come Home - Emma Blackery
> 
> Howl - Florence and The Machine, Bedroom Hymns - Florence and The Machine


	10. Chapter 10

**_SHATTER_ **

I understand why the broken speak

of ash

— & dust

—— & dirt

———& rust

The dissolution of all bright and beautiful hopes  
This empty, wandering planet all lost and lonely without your gravity-

Who do you turn on when it is Life  
Sets a boundary and says “here, and no further”  
When the jaded, bitter triumph of seven years love in abeyance  
Returns to give you a Home at last…  
Breaks down the barriers and storms the gates  
Arms flung wide to embrace you-

Turns aside and will not look your way.  
  


Where do you find peace

When all of your love and longing is returned  
Not in equal measure  
But disgust and disdain  
Profaning the needs of the body and the fuel of the soul  
As empty, hollow things.

When the shape and form for which you wept poetry  
And bled praise under moonlight  
Says “never again”  
and “never did”  
Left suddenly alone in yearning

When every new crack and crevasse  
Has no answering bridge  
And no tools to build  
Over the remnants of what was


	11. Chapter 11

**_PROMISE ME_ **

Do you remember what I wrote  
In the days before our Beginning?

> _Please don’t promise me forever_

It tastes like cold steel  
It feels like thorns across the skin

Forever feels like silence  
Ringing insistently  
Inescapable

Forever is salt  
Forever is waves of intrusive thought  
Forever is memories and hope

> _Please don’t promise me forever_

We are not immortal  
We are not all-knowing  
We are perfectly imperfect

Sometimes we fit  
Smooth and well-formed  
Beautiful and meant

Sometimes we don’t  
Promises get made  
Promises get broken  
Good intentions born of emotion

Desire and longing  
Are not enough to fill the space  
Black words on white  
Spilling from broken heart  
Grasping for any kind of understanding

Promise me today.  
Promise me now.

One moment.  
One heartbeat.  
One more breath.  
One instant.

Nothing more.

There is no certainty.  
There is no eternity.

Broken vows smell like sulfur.  
They feel like ash on the skin.  
It takes more than water  
To wash it away.

More than I have to give  
More than you can offer.

> _Do not promise me forever._

Today is enough.  
Today is all there is.

-Time makes liars of us all


	12. Chapter 12

**_PYRES_ **

i am built of funeral pyres  
i exist on the bones  
of everything that went before  
burned black and bleached by the sun

i am built of broken dreams  
i exist in half-forgotten memories  
the cast off detritus of a life  
that will never be lived, only remembered

i am built of ruins  
the earth of nations ground into my skin  
broken but unbowed  
calloused not cowed


	13. Chapter 13

**_REAPER_ **

Let me put the knife in your hands

You’re killing me anyway

Take responsibility

And be direct….

.

_For once **in your life**_


	14. Chapter 14

_**REACHING** _

I went reaching for you again

I shouldn’t have. I know better. Fuck.  
I keep looking at the spaces where you’re not.  
Anger is armor, rage keeps me warm…

_until it burns me again._

There is no getting over you.  
There is no getting past it.  
There is no forgiveness, no peace, just pain and regret and anger and

I’m not blameless. I never claimed to be.  
But the shield you raised against me dug deep like swords.   
Our future shattered before I even got the chance to really ask.

You never told me what the turning point was.  
You never told me when it became too much….   
Never said when it started to fall apart.

Remember how we said the first time, there was no good reason?

_This time, it’s worse._

There’s every reason.  
And it still hurts.


	15. Chapter 15

**_MIRRORS_ **

I poured out my aching soul to you  
Once upon a time

Whispers in the dark  
Your voice the music in the silence  
That ended with the line going dead  
In the moments before sleep claimed me

I tore open-  
Gaping wounds in my chest  
To give you the opportunity for true consent

Held the mirror to my image  
Reflecting all my endless fractures  
Seams and scars  
For you

For your fathomless gaze in silver glass

Your eventual inevitable rejection  
Left me exsanguinated  
Burned out and guttering in the wind  
Our four walls were meant  
to defend Us from.

There is no Our.  
There is no Us.  
For me, there is no you.

.

So I bound up my wounds  
Packed with salt and sewn  
And the mirror I hold  
No longer wears your face

This heart is not a home  
It is the graveyard  
Of all our forgotten hopes


	16. Chapter 16

**_ECHOES_ **

I remember echoes in the dark  
Your sounds and sighs  
And the sway of the house  
As the trains rushed by

Soft silken fur  
The weight of you against me  
The fog of your breath on my skin

I still reach for you  
For your hand  
For the surety of silver and soul

But the times grow fewer  
Farther between  
And in the spaces where you no longer exist  
  
I am growing


	17. Chapter 17

**_WERE_ **

Do you remember the way we were?  
Your desk, my blanket,  
Cat toys strewn across the floor

I remember-

Rain sounds  
Cars driving past in the damp haze  
Headlights through the open window

Your footsteps on the stairs  
Her soft screams of joy  
Kneeling down to remove your shoes,  
Stroke her head-

I remember the smells

Fresh and sweet,  
Clean salt of working class  
Dinner on the stove, waiting.

I don’t miss you so much these days  
I miss the way we were.

Together.


	18. Chapter 18

**MOVING ON**

many things are true

i can mourn everything we used to be   
while building the future with both hands

take one final glance over my shoulder   
and turn toward the rising dawn

the name on my lips is sweet salt   
and my heart is no longer reaching for yours

i found my water in the desert storm

_-his eyes are a firestorm, and he dances with my demons_


End file.
